EVENTS

They need a woman – just the one, mind

During my time in Cambridge, virtually every invitation I received to join a University committee was prefaced by the disclaimer that “we need a woman”. This had the dual effect of making me feel, on the one hand, obliged to accept and, on the other, less empowered to voice an opinion. In case I, or my colleagues, might forget why I was there, the papers for one senior promotions committee had an ‘f’ next to my name—not ‘F’ for Fiona but ‘f’ for female. When I complained, the person who took the blame was a (female) member of the secretarial staff and not the (male) chair of the committee.

And on the other hand there are the ones who pretend to be unaware of gender altogether.

While I was working in Cambridge I was involved in several rounds of recruitment of junior group leaders, which were notable not only for a lack of female appointments, but also for the lack of perception that this was a problem. When I raised the issue I frequently received—by way of justification—the response “I can’t tell the difference between a man and a woman”.

Oh goody, it’s “I don’t see color” in another form.

Being “gender blind” might be a legitimate aspiration for scientists, but in my experience it was a justification for discriminating against women. And what made the situation so dispiriting was that none of the men present during these discussions ever challenged the situation, or asked the same questions as me.

So, what is to be done? While academic institutions may genuinely aspire to increase the number of female professors, their prospects of success are low unless covert discrimination is discussed openly and tackled.

And now UCL, recently among the clued-up minority, has decided to hold its working dinners at the Garrick Club – a male members only joint which not long ago used to insist that its women guests use a different entrance and a different staircase, even.

They’ve got over that fetish but honestly!

(The story is in the Times but I refuse to give that Murdoch person any money.)

Another member said he had been undecided about how to vote. He asked: “I’m a huge supporter of all things anti-racist, non-gender and anti-ageist but why shouldn’t we have one or two places where chaps can get together?”

This has been roundly debunked with solid science. Anytime you can anonymize an approval process, removing indicators of gender, race or class while leaving in a list of qualifications, the process invariably shows a much more balanced approval rating for women, people of color, people of low income and LGBT folks.

This is true of loan applications, job applications, and so on. Furthermore, if you deliberately include false indicators, subconscious bias inevitably kicks in–identical applications from a woman or person of color, versus a white man, will receive a different reception.

In processes where you can’t use anonymity, sunlight and standardization can sometimes achieve the same effect–I’m pretty sure this blog was the one where I read about a UK study that showed that if a corporation makes executive compensation public, the wage gap shrinks dramatically, in part because women know what compensation they should be getting.

UK study that showed that if a corporation makes executive compensation public, the wage gap shrinks dramatically, in part because women know what compensation they should be getting.

I haven’t seen any figures on this, but it would be interesting. I work in a field where salaries are required to be public (i.e. a public employee, at a public college). I don’t know if there is a wage gap or not; I do know that, as far as I can tell, our school appears to pay at least somewhat equitably, and that salary differentials tend to be based on years of employment. Of course, since teaching itself is a field paid lower than other fields with equivalent education, experience, and hours of work, that just means that men are as underpaid as women. It does seem, however, that it is easier for men to work up in the field and move on to higher paid positions in academia, so that is probably how the gap is maintained.